


kids

by gothoria



Category: Criminal Minds (US TV)
Genre: Angry Spencer Reid, Angst, Canonical Character Death, Character Study, Child Neglect, Drug Addiction, Drug Dealing, Drug Use, F/M, Gen, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Drug Addiction, Introspection, LMAO, Minor Character Death, Overdosing, Sad Spencer Reid, Schizophrenia, Song fic, Spencer Reid Whump, angst with a weird ending, kids by current joys, really he’s just stubborn, thought provoking really, uh, why this so hard
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-13
Updated: 2020-07-14
Packaged: 2021-03-05 04:54:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 7,086
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25238818
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gothoria/pseuds/gothoria
Summary: spencer is just a kid. that’s what his team thinks, after all. he could be 70 years old and they would still see the 23 year old fresh from the academy. he’s mostly grateful for it. then, he isn’t.prison will do that to a person. it will make your nights restless, will make you so paranoid that you sleep with a gun in your bedroom. it will make you realize you’re not a kid anymore.what everyone fails to realize is that spencer has gone through these mistakes before. he always makes them. he used to try to fix them, try to right his wrongs.now? he just doesn’t have the energy. decides it’s better to forget how it felt to pick yourself up.(anything before prison just doesn’t seem to exist anymore.)
Relationships: Maeve Donovan/Spencer Reid, Maxine "Max" Brenner/Spencer Reid, Spencer Reid & Original Female Character(s), Spencer Reid & The BAU Team
Comments: 11
Kudos: 101





	1. i’m just a kid

**Author's Note:**

> um the maeve part kinda made me want to cry i think it’s the saddest thing to write about because he was so damn sad

his eyes darted towards the front door. he could see his father packing up a suitcase. his tie was done neatly, a windsor knot. spencer could see it from the doorway of his room. 

he could also see his mother, running her shaky hands through her beautiful blonde hair, tangling it like she was trying to clutch at something that was in her hair and it wouldn’t come loose. 

he worried about his mother. he thought his father did too, thought this father wanted to help his mother. he didn’t want to help her though. he wanted to relieve himself of this burden that diana reid has become. leaving spencer with his mother at the ripe young age of 10 seemed to be the solution. 

the further away from the door that he got, the louder his mother became. his father was shouting back at her, yelling curses at his wife. “you need help diana!” to which diana said, “i do have help!” 

spencer knew that wasn’t true. his mother could barely remember to eat some days, much less remember to get the help she needed. she couldn’t remember a lot of things, especially when she was having one of her episodes. 

episodes. ha. the only episodes he should know about are the ones playing on tv, the episodes of children’s shows. instead, he got the other definition. the ones where your mother claws at the skin on the inside of your elbow, insisting that the government is drugging you. 

he got the short and shitty end of the stick. 

his father ran a hand over his face, ruining the gelled back hairstyle that he had had moments earlier. he was losing it. sooner or later, he would snap, walk out of spencer’s life. spencer has known this for a year now, realizing it when his father had failed to pick up the experimental medication that his mother’s doctor had recommended. 

he just didn’t realize it would be so soon. so explosive. like everything had come apart, in the blink of an eye. the closer he got to the front door, the more debris came at him. 

more violent words, more glass on the floor from a picture frame his mother had thrown in all the chaos. “you’re hurting both of us, diana! i can’t take it anymore.” and then, he stepped out the door. the slam was louder than any of their words. 

the silence after was somehow louder. 

he crept out of the hiding place he had found behind the bookshelf, his mother clutching her head in her hands, shaking as she tried to find the broom she had abandoned before the argument with spencer’s dad. 

he didn’t know what to do though. he didn’t know if she was his mom today. maybe she would take one look at him, narrowing her eyes, and shake her head after a while, proclaiming, “you’re not my son. where is my son?” 

maybe she would be calm, take his hand with a gentle smile, and turn on the record player after inserting a fleetwood mac disk into it. they would sway, he would try to spin her, despite his height, and then they would hug on the couch. all would be well. 

today seemed to be okay. she was just shocked; that was all. “mama?” his voice sounded so tiny. granted, he was tiny. he was only 10 years old. 

his mom turned around, her eyes slightly crazed like they always were now. she still managed to smile at him, her pearly whites on display.  _ she was okay today. _

she beckoned him over, muttering a, “watch the glass,” when he got closer to the remains of the family photo that had sat on the table beside the door. her arms wrapped around him, bringing him in close to her, her hand finding a place in his curly brown hair. 

she mumbled, mostly to herself, how much she loved her son. every now and then, she would look down at him, smile, and go back to embracing him. 

he could tell that she hadn't really processed what had happened moments before. he, on the other hand, had already been thinking about the costs of supporting a mentally ill mother when you’re only 10 years old. 

this was las vegas though, and what happens in vegas, stays in vegas. 

so a plan was born. right there, in the middle of a living room that looked like a hurricane had gone through it, spencer got to thinking. he had plenty of options. gambling, getting an actual job, stealing. 

but, what could a ten-year-old do? besides taking down the ripped curtains, discarding the green plaid fabric in a black trash bag. he threw away most of what his father had left. there wasn’t much really, just a few knickknacks that he wouldn’t miss if he decided to come home. 

he threw them away because he had done the math. he had done the math when he told his father the statistic about children whose parents stuck together leading to a better education for the child. his father’s angry response of, “we’re not statistics.” had been enough for him to see that the possibility of his father returning had been a 0% chance. 

he just didn’t know how to be a parent anymore. not to a child prodigy. he didn’t know how to be the husband to a mentally ill woman. 

still, spencer, naively and like the child he was, couldn’t help but hope that their chances would improve. that his father would turn around, walk through the front door with a smile, and a cure to schizophrenia.

_ when pigs fly. _

that’s what spencer thought to himself whenever the more appealing version of events attacked his mind. it was a fantasy. it wouldn’t happen, and spencer had to think of a plan fast. 

for the time being, spencer went to school, finishing by the age of 12. the days went by fast, especially when you had a schizophrenic mother that required more attention than a newborn baby. 

it didn’t help that the caretaker he had hired cost so much, taking more money out of his pockets and leaving him with only a few hundred dollars for food and other necessities. college seemed like such a dream to him. a way to get away from all the responsibilities he held at home. 

caltech seemed to be screaming at him, begging to be chosen. it was a dream come true for him when he received a full ride to the school. with the departure from home, however, came more expenses. a part-time caretaker became a full-time caretaker, and a slight dent in his pockets had become a significant one. 

the jobs down at the local bookstore, the research lab, and the tutoring he offered could only provide so much. 

so, he took to the streets. 

graduation passed, 1 month and 15 days to be exact, and spencer had set out on making contacts. connections that might prove useful in the las vegas drug scene. 

drugs were probably the last thing he had wanted to do, but spencer had done his research already. loyal customers were big spenders, especially when they knew they could turn to you whenever they needed a fix. 

besides, who would suspect a 12-year-old? the las vegas police department would brush him off as just a roach on the side of the street, and he was grateful for that. if he had a record, any hope he had of joining the infamous BAU would be gone, and he would be subjected to time in prison. 

spencer reid did not belong in prison. 

so, he moved drugs. all the time spent after school in the chemistry lab was seriously starting to pay off. the marijuana was something that anyone could get their hands on, but spencer’s mix of cocaine and heroin was tough to beat. 

he had lots of customers, loyal ones that kept on running back to him for another taste. it worked for a couple of months. the first few ones were not a walk in the park, but he learned how to manage the business. he spent enough time watching how people ran their own businesses, taking all the information he could get, and putting it to good use for himself. 

for a long time, he had a good flow of money. no problems. everything was working out. so, he packed a bag full of hand me down clothes, mismatched socks, and his favorite books. books that were way past due, more like stolen at this point. the clerk down at the local library would never see those books again. 

he had grown attached to them, and they were probably the only thing he would have from las vegas while he was in pasadena. god knows his mother would never let him take just the tiniest thing from their home. her episodes had grown more violent and frankly, he didn’t want to anger her more. 

she had already slapped him once. had pushed him down to the floor, grabbing his arm with a strength that he didn’t know she had in her. she had twisted his arm, ignoring spencer’s cries of, “please! mom! i’m spencer reid, i’m not a spy!”, looking for a chip that she insisted was planted in his skin. the episode has only lasted a day, but it was by far the most scared spencer had ever felt in his own home. 

the fear of his own mother grew with each passing day, and he had to remind himself not to hide the kitchen knives in the morning, trusting that she wouldn’t go that far. the fear in him clutched onto his soul in the middle of the night, when he could hear his mother walking around in the dark, smashing glass plates on the floor in search of a tracking device. 

so, the books he had stolen from the public library were the only good things he wanted to take from vegas. a collection of poems, short stories, and scientific studies. the poems would keep him company, reminding him that he wasn’t the only one that felt a dull ache in his chest from time to time. the stories would give him a break from the constant worry, and the scientific studies would give him something to focus on. 

the studies would tell him how a cure for schizophrenia was such a long way from now, that it might not even be possible. he would say that they just weren’t working hard enough, devoting more time to the genetics part of the caltech library than was normal. 

he would spend days and days researching everything there was to schizophrenia, which medications proved effective long term, and which ones were candidates for more permanent happiness in the lives of schizophrenic patients. 

caltech also proved to be.. exciting. there were nights that spencer was up, studying for whatever test there was the next day, blocking out the noise of the dorm across the street that had blaring music and flashing lights. he would set aside the textbooks, put his elbows on the thrifted desk, and stare out the window in front of him with his face in his hands. 

he could see everything from here, could just hear the sound of something very expensive falling to the floor. he could see people drifting, floating in between strangers. 

he wanted to be one of those drifters. he wanted to relax. the sound of his alarm clock reminded him that he was not a drifter. he was a planner, and it was time to get back to work. 

he shut the blinds and forced himself to read another 100 pages of whatever reading his ‘the division of physics, mathematics, and astronomy’ professor had assigned him. 

the magenta lights from across the street would seep through the blinds in flashes, reminding spencer of what he could never have.

it didn’t matter how much he wanted it. 


	2. i always make mistakes (and i never say im sorry)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> spencer’s made a lot of mistakes in his lifetime. they have shaped his life in a way he never thought possible, and have torn him down more times than he can count.

the vials in his hands felt awfully heavy for their size. they seemed to drag him down, whispering things into his ears. 

“ _ you’re a sinner, spencer reid. take it, and you won’t feel like one anymore. you’ll be pure. _ ” 

the whispers were getting louder and louder, filling his mind with awful thoughts. how bad would it be if he just took out the needle in his bad, pushed it through the skin on the inside of his elbow, and relaxed for a while? 

the team didn’t need him anyway. they didn’t need him to find out where he was, they probably would’ve found out anyway. morgan would pick up on some odd feature of the shed and narrow down a list of all the houses with sheds with garcia’s help. then, they would fix on one and find him, shovel in his hand as he prepared himself for his death. 

the whispers were more like screams now, bouncing around his head and making the sides of it throb painfully. 

he took a deep breath, looking up to see himself in the bathroom mirror. he looked awful. he wasn’t sure if this person was even him anymore. spencer reid was a dealer. he wasn’t a user. 

_ funny how one kidnapping can change an FBI agent so drastically.  _

the air was cold. the sweater he was wearing was good protection against it. he was moving to take it off, though. his hands went down to his belt, taking it off in swift motion and wrapping it around his bicep. 

his hair flopped around as he moved frantically to look for the needle in his bag. his movements resembled that of an addict, and he had to remind himself that he was one. he was a drug addict. 

no matter what he told himself, the reality was that the dilaudid was his only escape. his way of finding peace, after tobias. he was no better than the junkies he had sold to back in las vegas, scratching at the track marks with desperation in their eyes. they would do anything for another fix. 

so would spencer. 

he pushed the needle in only seconds after he had found it and filled it with the drug. the release made him tilt his head back, eyes closed as the ecstasy made its way through his body. 

it was cold. the sensation was cold. 

he wanted to be warm. but for now, the cold would do. it distracted him from how far away he was from the warmth he longed for. 

what spencer neglected to realize, in his drugged-out phase, was how many hits he had already taken the night before. it was one too many. 

he took three steps into the conference room, collapsing on his fourth. 

faintly, he could hear the scream that came from penelope. he could hear morgan shout his name with all the urgency he could possess. he could hear hotch giving orders to call an ambulance, to get them here as quickly as possible. 

overdosing was an out of body experience. it was feeling your body move and not being able to do anything to stop it. the seizure wasn’t something new, but this time he found himself damning the very reason he was having it. 

overdosing was an out of body experience until it wasn’t. it became an experience he wouldn’t remember after a few minutes of lying on the floor unconscious. 

when he did come to, it was in a hospital room. IV’s were stuck inside of his skin, close to where he would stick a needle of his own. 

“you had us worried sick, boy wonder.”

of course. penelope, in all of her optimism and righteousness, would be the one to stay with him. 

he sat up, a pain in his head setting in almost immediately. she rushed over to his side from the place under the doorway, easing him up slowly. “oh, take it slowly please spencer.” 

she was so..  _ good _ . she was the image of kindness. and he was the image of a boy with a drug addiction that had nearly cost him his life. 

_ god, what was he gonna do? _

get angry. apparently. 

the tears were spilling out before she could even say another word. penelope frowned, her eyebrows scrunched up, hands moving to rest over his. “it’s okay, spencer, you’re okay.” he shook his head. 

“i’ve ruined everything, haven’t i? you don’t need to be here anymore. i’ll be fine, i don’t have a problem that needs fixing.” she took a sharp breath, looking away for a moment before returning her attention to him. 

she always had a good sense of empathy. would cry at a sad romantic movie on tv, or when she saw those ads about broken families like her own. 

“spencer, it’ll be fine-“ 

he cut her off with a shaking of his head, and a strong voice. “i am fine. now, garcia, can you please leave and tell them i’ll come in as soon as possible? there’s nothing wrong and i’ll be able to work.” 

she looked over at his track marks, burning a hole through his skin with her stare. she looked up at his eyes. they were rimmed with red. it didn’t take a 187 IQ to figure out what was going on. still, she nodded, picked up her colorful pink bag off the bedside table, and closed the door behind her. 

he was true to his word. he got better at hiding the signs, made sure to write down how much he had taken on a sticky note attached to his fridge. 

then, he realized what he was doing to himself. what he was doing to others. he was lashing out at emily, the new girl who had been nothing but kind to him and had shown a real concern for him. 

he sobered up. went to meetings, and when anyone asked where he had been, he just said, “the movies.” nobody took notice of how his skin had started to gain a little more color, how his nails were looking less bitten off, and more like they had been properly cut. 

that’s what he thought, anyway. no one had even acknowledged his problem, so they probably had never even noticed. he missed the long stares he got whenever he showed up late. he missed how jj would take a look at him, and erase a ‘lunch with spencer’ from her calendar. he missed how hotch gave him significantly less time in the field, placing him in the station of whatever town they were in instead. 

he missed all the signs that they were taking notice. 

and whenever someone asked where he had gotten the track marks on the skin inside of his elbow, he just said, “it was a silly mistake i made when i was younger. nothing serious.” he was different now. that’s what he told himself after mexico. 

it was just a mistake, and his family hadn’t received a “sorry for getting addicted to dilaudid.” 

_ his so-called family didn’t deserve it.  _

the second time he makes a mistake is when he thinks he is worthy enough to save the love of his life. 

he is not worthy enough. he is not fast, or good enough to save her. it makes him feel empty inside. he spends his time, trying to fix himself and fill that emptiness in his chest but he doesn’t have it in him. 

it’s foolish of him to think that he was ever worthy. i mean, really, he couldn’t even figure out the fact that her stalker was a girl. 

still, he clings onto every memory he had with her. he recites the conversations they had in his head, memorizing the tone of her voice and finding comfort in how they both knew exactly what to say when they spoke to each other. 

he fails to find comfort in how her last moments went. how he will forever spend his days, replying that scene in his mind. the one thing he loves is how she knew that he loved her and she loved him. even if they never said it. 

the moments after that gunshot rang out are a blur. he remembers getting to his apartment. finding that book that she left him and crying for hours afterward, when he’s all alone. 

he struggles to accept the fact that she’s dead. insists to himself that it’s all just one bad dream and he’ll wake up any minute now, payphone ringing as he walks down a D.C. street just to find one. he never wakes up and it gets harder to go to sleep every night, knowing that she’ll never call him again. 

he keeps the book in his bag, relishing in the fact that they knew each other so well, loved each so much that they already knew exactly what the other would like. it was all the same things that he liked. she knew him so well and he fears that he’ll never find that type of love with another person. the type where you buy each other the same book unknowingly.

her parents call him, a week after. her funeral will be held in two days and they’re wondering if he can make it. it takes everything in him to not say, 

_ “no, i will not make it because your daughter didn’t and it’s all my fault.” _

he settles for a quiet ‘yes, thank you for telling me.’ and hangs up almost immediately after. hearing her parent's voice instead of hers only makes it that much more real. 

it’s been days since he last shaved, and a beard has already grown. it surprised derek when he came by, checking up on him and replenishing the food in his cabinets at garcia’s request. 

he reminds himself that she wouldn’t want him like this. she would want him out there, doing his job and saving people. if she was here, he would tell her how her death has made it seem like all the people he saved would never equate to how he had failed to save her. she was the one good thing he had, and he couldn’t do a damn thing to keep her safe. 

she would smile fondly and shake her head. quote some author that they both knew, and he would smile back. she would press a soft hand onto his cheek, tell him about how the world was better when he was doing his job, and all would be well. 

her hand isn’t soft anymore. it’s not warm, and it would feel cold on his skin. he has to tell himself to stop thinking about her. she’s never coming back, as much as he wants her to. 

when he arrives at the funeral, the entire room quiets down. he wants to scream at the guests for that. wants to ask why they’re all looking at him like he’s about to fall to his knees, cry, and never come back up. 

he realizes that it’s because his eyes are red, and his nose is puffy and red as well. he has cried more in the last hour than he has all day. he has spent hours, wondering if today would’ve been the day they met instead of the day of her funeral. 

her parents make their way over to him. her mother, in all the kindness that she described her in, takes him into his arms. he sobs into her shoulder, shaking as he repeats the same words over and over again. 

“ _ i’m so sorry for not saving her, i tried so hard and i couldn’t save her.” _

she quiets him down, tears streaming from her eyes as well. “ _ it’s okay. you tried your best, and she loved you. she loved you until her last breath, spencer reid.” _ it makes his heart a little less heavy when he hears it from her. 

her dad has joined in on their hug, he is rubbing spencer’s back so comfortingly that spencer is convinced he might just tumble into his arms and fall asleep from the exhaustion. he hasn’t gotten a good night’s sleep in weeks. 

he murmurs comforting words to them, the three of them ignoring the looks of sympathy they are receiving from everyone in the room. they are far too damaged to care. she wouldn’t care either. 

the team arrives and spencer regrets coming to the event. to her funeral. they look at them with sympathy, but theirs is different. it is genuine. their youngest has learned how it feels to lose the person they love the most in the entire world and he has forgotten how to breathe in a world without her. they stay by his side when he separates from her parents. 

derek pulls him into a hug when he gets the chance to, tells him how much she would want him to move on. he wants to punch him in the face, but he knows derek is right. 

plus, he can’t spend his entire life lingering on her: he will kill himself and his soul if he does. lord knows he’s already started to chip away at it. 

when the service has ended, and a majority of guests have departed, he makes his way to her parents again. he takes both of their hands in his and says two simple words. 

“ _ i’m sorry.” _

they brush it off, her dad pats him on the back. “ _ spencer, there is no need to be sorry.”  _ her mother says, and her face tells him that she truly means her words. he struggles to grasp that they don’t hate him, that he is not the bane of their existence. he wonders how people can be so kind but then remembers that these people are the parents of the love of his life, and she was always kind. she got it from them. 

the thing is, he knows why he is insisting on saying sorry to them after her death. after maeve’s death. 

he knows why he says sorry to the people who don’t deserve it too.

_ he says sorry to them because he cannot say sorry to the one person who deserves it. _


	3. i’m no longer a kid (and everything has changed)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> sometimes, a little bit of weed and deep thoughts are exactly what you need.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> would highly recommend listening to the song this fic is based off, kids by current joys, when reading.

after mexico, spencer lost himself. 

tunnel vision and ptsd were a killer combination. they kept him up at night. waking up with shallow breaths and his best friend’s name on his lips. he could see the blood on his hands. he could see the blood of his friend and of the inmates he had poisoned. 

he was different. but not in a good way. 

when claire moved into the apartment below him, he felt the urge to say sorry. sorry for keeping her up at night with his cries, with his screams for someone to help his friend. “please help him!” was a common phrase that he shouted in his sleep. 

he felt sorry that claire had to stick around and listen to a man with far too many issues to count. 

it surprised him when she was the one that said sorry. 

she had knocked on his door at 3 in the morning, shortly after he had woken up from yet another haunting dream. 

_ the feeling of blood on his hands was torturing his mind, and he had to reassure himself several times that it wasn’t there. _

her black hair stuck to her face, red lines crisscrossing over her arm, and he realized that she had probably just woken up too. 

she didn’t look mad though. she actually looked at him with sympathy. like she knew exactly what he was going through.  _ he doubted it. _

“sorry for coming unannounced, but are you alright? i know we haven’t really gotten to talk since i moved in last week but, i am your neighbor and i couldn’t help but wake up to some pretty bad noises.” 

he fiddled with the lock on his door, stopping himself when he realized that she actually wanted an answer and wasn’t just here to tell him to shut up and go back to sleep. 

he looked at her. really looked at her. brown eyes, black hair, and freckles that dusted over her cheeks. 

words eventually came out of his mouth. “yes. i think so.” she laughed at that, said, “if you think so, then you’re not really okay. you need company?” 

_ yes. i need help. i need someone to help me think.  _

he would’ve said this if he had more confidence. he settled for a nod and a step to the side that allowed her the space to come into this apartment. 

she whistled when she took a view of the living room. it was a little messy, he hadn’t had the chance to dust off all the things that had gotten dirtier over his time in prison. 

when he came back to his apartment for the first time, his last thought was cleaning. his first one was,  _ ‘i need a nap.’ _

“you know how to keep yourself occupied, don’t you?” he chuckled and stuffed his hands into his pajama bottoms, the plaid fabric wrinkled from how much he had moved around in his sleep. 

“you could say that. i like to read in my spare time, and these books are some of my favorites.” 

she took a book off a shelf, flipping it around to read the synopsis printed on the back. “any of these help with the addiction?” 

he stammered, struggling to find the words to say.  _ how could she know? _ “t-the what? i don’t have one.” she waved a hand in his direction, vaguely pointing at the faded track marks. 

“takes one to know one. how long you been clean?” 

he ran a hand through his hair, the mess of curls puffing out to the back. “about 11 years now.” she nodded, voice never quivering, unlike his. “5 years here. like i said, takes one to know one.” 

now that she mentioned it, he could see track marks of her own on her tanned skin. “so, which do you recommend?” he walked over to her side, picking out ‘the bell jar’ by sylvia plath. 

“this one. it’s one of my favorites.” she took it from his hands and he had to stop himself from holding onto it. he didn’t really like people touching the things he held so dearly to him. he could make an exception tonight. 

she opened the book, running her fingers down the pages. “looks good. i’ll have to find a copy of my own.” she closed it with a snap and handed it back to him, smiling up at him. 

he nodded, returning the small smile before placing the book back on the shelf. 

she walked around, eyes taking in everything around her. she took notice of the lack of food in his open cabinets, closing them swiftly and then turning around to face him. 

he was nervous, anyone could see it. what people failed to see was the hand that itched towards the track marks that were faded. “how long have you been craving?” 

he sighed, she had seen right through him again.  _ takes one to know one,  _ he thought to himself. he spoke with a gentle tone, not wanting to scare her away. “since i was drugged. it was out of my hands, and i haven’t been able to relax since.” 

she nodded, making herself comfortable on the brown leather couch and patting the seat next to her. she looked more at home in his apartment than he had felt in weeks. 

“now, i know they say not to take another drug to help with the withdrawal of the drug of your choice but.. i have some joints in a baggie in my jacket, along with a light. are you up for it?” 

he struggled to find words suitable enough for what he wanted to say. he settled on, “you could be a serial killer, trying to lower my defenses.” she shrugged, a smile lighting up her face. “so could you. im willing to take the risk either way.” it was naive of her, but he liked it.

sometimes it was better to be naive and trust than it was to be absolutely broken like he was. he hadn’t trusted anyone to know that he was going to mexico for his mother’s medication and look where that had gotten him. 

he nodded at her words, “fair point.” she responded with a smug, “i try.” he held out his hand, and she grinned at him. “that’s more like it spencer.” she dug into the inside of her jean jacket, producing a zip lock bag with three joints in it and a small lighter. 

they took a joint in between their teeth, claire lighting up the both of them before standing from the couch. she held out a hand to spencer, and despite his discomfort at physical contact, he found himself taking it. 

she led him to the entryway of his apartment, laying down on the floor and letting her head fall to the ground with a soft thump. spencer did the same, just in the opposite direction. 

for a while, all they did was smoke in quiet. their minds were obviously feeling the effects of the drug, and spencer found himself calming down after only a few hits. 

the longing for dilaudid was no longer there, replaced by a longing for some pasta and licorice. his favorite candy from his childhood and pasta. the pasta bit probably came from his love for rossi’s spaghetti. 

the bland thoughts of food were interrupted by claire’s voice. “where do you think we go when we die?” 

he was taken aback by her question. here he was, thinking about spaghetti and how the a/c turned on every 30 minutes, and claire was thinking about the afterlife. 

he had difficulty picking out his words. that never used to happen before. before, he would have a statistic for her about near-death experiences, how people saw different things and there was no one afterlife. 

a short, “i’m not sure.” is what he said instead. she clearly didn’t buy it because she turned her head to face him with red-rimmed eyes and a confused look on her face. “would’ve thought a scholar like you would have a better answer.” 

he shrugged as best as he could, the floor burning his skin as he did, “i don't think i have all the answers.” she nodded, muttering a small, ‘sorry’ before turning her head back to face the popcorn ceiling. 

he thought that was the end of it. he was wrong. 

“i would just like to think that my dad is someplace.. nice, you know? he worked so hard for a company that didn’t give two shits about him.” 

he looked over at her this time, her head following shortly after his. he sighed, taking a drag of the nearly done joint. “i think we go wherever we wanted to go. to be with our loved ones, maybe. or maybe to a place we never got to see.” she took his answer, nodded. 

“where would you go?” 

he avoided her gaze, looking back up at the ceiling. she did the same. “anywhere but here.” she huffed out a laugh through her nose, “am i that bad?” he laughed gently, shaking his head. 

“not at all.” 

she smiled at him. he could feel it. he smiled back. 

after that, the conversation flowed with little effort. they talked about claire’s dad, who was killed while he was serving in the marine corps when she was 19. his life before the army had consisted of working for a factory that was slowly turning into a dead-end job with little pay. she had never truly gotten over it, how her father's life was taken before he could find true happiness.

she talked about how she had been lost for years, how her addiction had started when the alcohol just wasn’t cutting it for her anymore. she turned her life around when her boyfriend told her that she was more devoted to heroin than she was to him. 

she never got rid of the image of his angry face, yelling at her, pushing her around, and complaining about her instead of helping her. she got better to spite him, to show him that she could and would do it. 

it had been hard, especially when your support system only consisted of a coworker who knew just the bare bones of how a withdrawal could feel, of what withdrawal would do to the addict. she didn’t regret it. the job at the museum, curating art and leading tours, was far too amazing for her to regret. 

in turn, spencer told her about his job. how he was feeling the pressure of a quick recovery and a clean psych evaluation. he wasn’t sure he would be able to pass the eval. after all, getting high on your floor probably wasn’t the best thing for a newly freed FBI agent. 

he told her about how his mother had been the reason that he had turned to dealing, how her illness had been one of the most expensive things he had to work through. he also told her about how much he loved his mother, despite the obvious problems. 

he also told her about how he had felt when he lost maeve. how he had spent a whole month on the verge of tears constantly. how he still looked for her face in every date that his friend, garcia set him up on. eventually, he stopped looking. he found a girl named maxine that was nothing like maeve but carried qualities that fit perfectly with his. 

that didn’t mean that he was replacing maeve. she reassured him that she didn’t think that and praised him for moving on. he tried not to cry but a few stray tears fell out when he told her about the book he still carried in his bag, how he had loved her so desperately. she cried with him. it was nice to know that he wasn’t just a wuss who cried at the simplest things.

she told him about herself and he did the same. they found peace on his wood floor, listening to the sounds of the a/c and the next-door neighbor watching some horror movie. their conversation turned into another one of those thought-provoking ones when she asked him, “do you think we’ll ever be normal? not crave?” 

he sat up, tossing the joint onto the dining table, running a hand through his brown hair. she did the same, and crisscrossed her legs under her. “i don’t think so. we’re too.. susceptible. a drug will do that to you.” she frowned at his answer, was probably expecting a, ‘yes, we are normal’ from him. 

he didn’t want to be a hypocrite though. normal consisted of never having touched a drug harder than marijuana after high school. besides, how normal could an addict get? 

“i just want to be normal. i want to feel better.. “

he sighed, his white shirt feeling too tight as that dull ache came back to clutch at his soul. it was suffocating, the aching. it was like a constant reminder that he wasn’t strong enough. he hadn’t been able to fight off those whispers in his mind. 

she looked like she was about to cry and spencer, being the person he was, took her in his arms. rocked her back and forth as she sobbed into his shoulder, her hands clutching onto the front of his shirt. 

he whispered words meant to comfort her, rubbed her back gently. the apartment was eerily quiet, save for the occasional sniffle from the girl wrapped up in his arms. after a while, she moved away, wrapping her arms around her middle. 

“i’m really sorry about that. i think it’s just the weed.. messing with me.” he waved a hand in dismissal, “don’t worry about it. the sun is gonna rise in awhile. you need me to walk you back to your apartment?” 

she was obviously surprised by his offer, her eyebrows raising before she nodded with a smile. “if it’s not too much trouble.” he shook his head, offered her a smile of his own and rose to his feet. 

he offered her a helping hand, she took it, and then they made their way down the stairs to the floor below. 

they made small talk while they walked, spencer reaching out to steady her whenever she swayed too much to one side, the weed taking clear effect. the small talk mostly consisted of book recommendations, claire reminding spencer that he needed to get food for his cabinets, and spencer telling claire about prison. 

she didn’t look at him with pity in her eyes. she looked like she wanted to help him, in any way possible. 

when they reached her apartment, he was sad to see her go. it was so rare for him to make a friend. a small part of him wondered if this was all just a hallucination, but he knew the stats and schizophrenic visions would be very unlikely at his age. 

didn’t stop him from reaching a hand out to touch the cream colored wall, grounding himself in the fact that this was real. “this is me. have a good night spencer, try to get some rest?” she smiled up at him, digging through her jean jacket for the pair of keys she had been holding when she came to his apartment. 

he nodded, “i’ll try.” she accepted his response, bid him goodnight, and shut the door. 

on the walk back up to his apartment, he found himself thinking more and more about the afterlife, and about how it would feel if he didn’t have this addiction to battle. 

he didn’t stop thinking about those things until his head reached his pillow and a stray thought ran through his mind, providing an answer.

‘an afterlife won’t matter if you spent your whole life focusing on your issues. you’ll have been reduced to nothing but your problems.” 

he was no longer in a cell. no longer wanting for a drug that would only provide temporary comfort, and would ultimately end in him getting angrier and making his friendships strained. no longer lingering on maeve and his self-doubt. 

he was no longer hurting. the dull ache in his chest had subsided. 

he slipped under the covers and fell asleep, sleeping through the entire night for the first time in weeks. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> again, was this even good??? like it seems good to me but ??? maybe it’s actually shit 😳 let me know

**Author's Note:**

> was this even good LMAO


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